Educational institutions around the world have to deploy enterprise grade network solutions in order to address a highly connected user base made up of students, faculty and departments that can number in the tens of thousands. As more devices become part of this ecosystem, universities, high schools and even elementary schools now demand and expect reliable services with high-levels of availability. For a major school campus in Cambridge, the organization has selected Nokia (News - Alert)'s Passive Optical LAN (POL) solution to deliver educational services via high-speed broadband connections, which will be deployed by technology integrator FWD-IP.
Nokia provides its POL technology for different verticals, including enterprises, educational institutions, the hospitality sector, healthcare and other segments. The POL for universities is designed to support the functions of multiple systems for dormitories, libraries, faculty offices, recreation areas, F&B outlets, healthcare, security, management facilities and more on a single network.
Instead of using copper cable, Nokia uses fiber-optic along with the Gigabit Passive Optical Network (GPON) transmission protocol to deliver commercial and mission critical broadband services to users globally. This same technology is applied to universities to support multiple systems by bringing LAN to light speed, and according to Nokia outperforming Ethernet LAN.
The POL is better in terms of capacity by delivering 2.5 Gbps downstream with GPON and 1.2 Gbps upstream on each fiber. This will allow the campus in Cambridge to bring together separate networks and get rid of bottlenecks while delivering gigabit speeds to all users. Additional benefits include lower costs, military-grade security, carrier-grade reliability, flexibility to deploy anywhere, simplicity and longevity.
Federico Guillén, Head of Fixed Networks at Nokia, said, “Nokia's Passive Optical LAN solution is ideal for school campuses that are often seeking a viable, simple and cost effective networking solution that can effectively accommodate the evolving connectivity needs of their students today and in the future.”
The technology integrator, FWD-IP, says this will allow the campus to manage and adapt to evolving communication demands. With gigabit services becoming standard in large organizations, the selection of the Nokia POL is going to future-proof the school’s network infrastructure with capabilities for outperforming traditional solutions such as copper.
Optical fiber has almost unlimited capacity with easy upgrades to 10G or 40G speeds, using the same infrastructure, this according to Nokia. This means the school will now be able to deliver unlimited data capacity and support all video, voice and data requirements over a single fiber optic cable for next generation communications.
Edited by Alicia Young